10 Highest-Grossing Sam Raimi Movies

The rise of Sam Raimi is an inspirational one for any aspiring filmmakers, as the cult movie icon came from humble beginnings and turned into one of the industry’s most profitable filmmakers. While he initiated his career working on low-budget horror films working with his lifelong friend and frequent star, Bruce Campbell, Raimi has created some of the most profitable film franchises of all-time. Without the success of Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy, it’s unlikely that the superhero genre would be as successful as it is today.

While he certainly has a track record of getting great performances from his actors, not all of Raimi’s films have been hits. His ambition to break into other genres led to a few creative and financial setbacks. However, Raimi has managed to overcome these setbacks and continues to leave his own stamp on the film industry with his upcoming projects. Here are the highest-grossing Sam Raimi movies.

10 ‘The Quick and the Dead’ (1995)

Worldwide gross: $18,636,537

The Quick and the Dead tried to take advantage of the rising popularity of Westerns in the 1990s, as hits like Unforgiven and Young Guns had revitalized interest in the genre. Earning over $18 million at the global box office, The Quick and the Dead was still considered a financial disappointment, as audiences weren’t as charmed by Raimi’s subversive take on genre archetypes as they were with more traditional Westerns. Despite the star power of Sharon Stone, Gene Hackman, Russell Crowe, and a young Leonardo DiCaprio, The Quick and the Dead put Raimi’s commercial prospects in jeopardy.

While its box office performance was disappointing, The Quick and the Dead has been embraced as a cult classic by hardcore fans of Raimi’s work. The film draws from many of the “splatter horror” elements of Raimi’s early work to create a wholly unique version of a gunslinger story.

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9 ‘The Gift’ (2000)

Worldwide gross: $44,567,606

While he is acclaimed as one of the most successful horror directors of all time, Raimi took a risk on a more serious supernatural drama with his 2000 film The Gift. Although it lacked the action of his Spider-Man films and the scariness of his Evil Dead franchise, The Gift still managed to earn a respectable gross of over $44 million at the global box office. Considering its modest budget and relatively non-traditional narrative structure, The Gift succeeded about as well as it ever could have hoped to given the parameters of its genre.

While not necessarily ranked as one of his best films, The Gift is an outlier within Raimi’s filmography due to its more mature themes of societal responsibility, loss, and overcoming grief. In retrospect, Raimi’s grounded approach and the underrated performance by Cate Blanchett have become the subject of critical acclaim.

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8 ‘For The Love Of The Game’ (1999)

Worldwide gross: $46,112,640

Kevin Costner’s name is almost synonymous with sports movie classics, as films like Tin Cup, Field of Dreams, Bull Durham, and Draft Day are remembered as some of the best in the genre. Unfortunately, Costner’s collaboration with Raimi on the 1993 baseball film For The Love Of The Game failed to revitalize interest in sports cinema. Grossing over $46 million at the global box office on a budget of $80 million, For The Love Of The Game was a financial disaster that put Raimi’s future prospects as a filmmaker in jeopardy.

While reviews were critical of the film’s antiquated approach, it’s still admirable that Raimi attempted to try something radically different from anything he’d attempted before. While he’s certainly most closely associated with his horror and superhero films, Raimi’s willingness to experiment with different genres is what makes him such an appealing artist.

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7 ‘Darkman’ (1990)

Worldwide gross: $48,878,502

Before his Spider-Man trilogy initiated one of the most popular comic book franchises in film history, Raimi delivered a very different type of superhero movie with his 1990 thriller Darkman. Despite being a dark, R-rated revenge thriller with aspects of horror, Darkman earned an impressive global box office total of over $48 million. Considering that the film was moderately budget at only $8 million, Darkman was an unqualified success that spawned several sequels that Raimi was not involved with.

In addition to proving Raimi’s merits as a superhero director, Darkman introduced Liam Neeson’s potential as an action star. The Irish actor got his breakout role thanks to Raimi, and would become one of the 1990s’ most popular actors. Neeson would later come to dominate the action genre two decades later thanks to the success of films like The Grey, Non-Stop, Run All Night, and the Taken franchise.

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6 ‘Drag Me To Hell’ (2009)

Worldwide gross: $90,842,646

While his success with the Spider-Man franchis had endeared him to a larger audience, Raimi returned to his horror roots with 2009’s Drag Me To Hell. Proving that PG-13 horror films could be just as terrifying as their R-rated counterparts, Drag Me To Hell was an unabashed throwback to Raimi’s original Evil Dead films with its shocking gore sequence and dark sense of humor. It became his most commercially successful horror film to date, earning an impressive global box office total of over $90 million.

Drag Me To Hell proved why the horror genre is such a hot commodity, as its relatively low badger of $30 million allowed it to become very profitable. While Drag Me To Hell was not connected to a previously established franchise, Raimi’s name was enough to attract viewers, as strong word-of-mouth allowed the film to maximize its financial potential.

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5 ‘Oz the Great and Powerful’ (2013)

Worldwide gross: $493,311,825

One of the more confusing projects of Raimi’s career was Oz the Great and Powerful, as it was unclear why the horror-themed filmmaker would be asked to direct a prequel to one of the most iconic family fantasy films of all-time. It’s unclear how successful Oz the Great and Powerful actually was, as despite an impressive global box office gross of over $493 million, its sizable budget of $215 million suggested that Walt Disney Pictures may have been expecting a greater total sum. The film was also notably Raimi’s first experiment with 3D.

Despite the popularity of the Wizard of Oz franchise, Oz the Great and Powerful failed to kickstart a new series for Raimi. The film led him to take the longest break between films of his entire career before he began working with Marvel Studios on the sequel to Doctor Strange.

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4 ‘Spider-Man 2’ (2004)

Worldwide gross: $788,976,453

While it’s often considered to be one of the greatest superhero films ever made, Spider-Man 2was actually the lowest-grossing film in Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy. Despite coming in with a slightly lower global box office total than its predecessor, Spider-Man 2’s impressive $788 million gross indicated that the superhero genre was now a mainstay in popular culture. In addition to establishing an all-time great villain with Alfred Molina’s Doctor Otto Octavian, Spider-Man 2 ended with a compelling cliffhanger for the third entry in the series.

The Spider-Man franchise continues to be immensely popular, even when the phrase “superhero fatigue” begins to feel more like a reality. There is still a lot of nostalgia for the work that Raimi did with his trilogy, as Tobey Maguire’s cameo in Spider-Man: No Way Home helped push the MCU sequel to greater box office highs.

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3 ‘Spider-Man’ (2002)

Worldwide gross: $825,025,036

Although 1998’s Blade and 2000’s X-Men were both modest hits that indicated that the superhero genre had potential, 2002’s Spider-Mansolidified the blockbuster status of comic book films. Earning an astounding box office total of over $825 million, Raimi’s origin story for the masked webslinger managed to appeal to both lifelong readers of Stan Lee’s comics and those completely unfamiliar with the character. It initiated a trilogy that is often ranked among the best in cinematic history.

While the film obviously had the benefit of the wealth of source material, Spider-Man’s success is largely indebted to Raimi himself. By incorporating action, drama, romance, suspense, and cheeky humor in equal measure, Raimi created a quintessential summer blockbuster that had viewers returning to the theater out of pure elation. While the film has been in development for years, it was the perseverance of Raimi’s vision that turned it into a massive hit.

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2 ‘Spider-Man 3’ (2007)

Worldwide gross: $894,983,373

Despite being regarded as a massive disappointment when compared to the first two installments in the series, Spider-Man 3 became the highest-grossing film in Raimi’s trilogy, and remained the highest-grossing Spider-Man film until Spider-Man: Far From Home passed it in 2019. Although the film’s gloomy tone and overabundance of villains may have given it less rewatch value, the film still clocked in with an incredible box office total of $894 million globally.

Despite being the biggest hit of the series thus far, Spider-Man 3’s behind-the-scenes drama brought Raimi’s version of the series to an early end. Frustrated by Sony Pictures’ creative meddling with the script and insertion of additional characters, Raimi chose to leave the production of Spider-Man 4 out of fear of disappointing the fans once more. While the bad review didn’t hurt Spider-Man 3’s box office, they may have drained Raimi’s enthusiasm for the series.

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1 ‘Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness’ (2022)

Worldwide gross: $955,775,804

While Marvel Studios has struggled in the aftermath of Avengers: Endgame with many disappointing films, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness was a massive win for the MCU and became Raimi’s highest-grossing film to date. Grossing over $955 million at the global box office, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness outperformed the first Doctor Strange film, in no small part thanks to the popularity of Elizabeth Olson’s Wanda Maximoff in the aftermath of Disney+’s WandaVision series.

Given that the film earned generally favorable reviews and teased future possibilities for the Marvel Multiverse, it’s somewhat surprising that a third Doctor Strange film has yet to be announced. While Marvel Studios films like The Marvels and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania offered diminishing returns, the Doctor Strange series may have the potential to keep succeeding with additional installments.

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